The subtitle of this album is The Back Catalogue and that’s exactly what it is – a collection of singles and remixes, plus a few unreleased tracks from this Californian DJ, record digger and beat freak. It’s nicely arranged so that it’s not obvious it is a collection of material not created as an album.

Things kick off with the floating vocals and soaring strings of the gentle, downbeat Four Hills and those elements are present even in the more dancefloor-focused tunes like A Place To Go, which marries those sounds with an insistent bass line and broken beats guaranteed to get you bopping.

As you might have guessed, there’s a dose of borrowing, both aesthetic and sample-wise, from the disco era but, while it is often reminiscent of that, it never sounds too derivative, always sounding like a fresh bringing together of the feel-good factor of the horn, string and vocal elements of that genre with the drums, bass, and samples of the modern beats scene, whether that be with a resulting sound of chilled out and Sunday afternoon or funk-fuelled and Saturday night.

House heads will appreciate the exclusive early release on this album of Day’s remix of a Mo Horizons tune, which is instrumental Latin bliss married with an up tempo rolling broken beat perfect for summer parties. Bring them on! And, judging from this release, bring on Day’s promised studio album of brand new material that is on its way as something of an epilogue later in the year.

In the meantime, Day fans will be lapping this up and those who are not, but like their chilled and mid-tempo beats, should make sure they check this out.

Rating: 8/10

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Track Listing:
1. Four Hills 
2. Place to Go 
3. Glue-Making a Mess [Day Remix Interlude] 
4. What Planet What Station [Instrumental] 
5. Manha [#] 
6. Koolude [#] 
7. Close Your Eyes 
8. Lucien 
9. Day and Exile [Live][#] 
10. Lovebug 
11. Gone Bad 
12. Ay y N'Ama [Day Remix] - Mo' Horizons 
13. Closer [#] 
14. Make You 

This was a RTRFM Full Frequency album feature.

Label: Melting Pot/Creative Vibes